The present invention relates to a wafer inspecting apparatus and method which enable visual macroscopic inspection of a wafer.
A wafer inspecting apparatus has conventionally been put into practical use, which can pick up a desired wafer from a wafer holder holding a plurality of wafers and macroscopically inspect the picked wafer by visual observation. For example, according to one such apparatus, a desired wafer is picked up from a wafer holder holding a plurality of wafers by a wafer pickup/return arm, and is supplied onto a macro-table. The edge portion of the lower surface of the wafer supplied onto the macro-table is held by suction with a wafer holding arm, and the wafer is turned. After the lower surface of the wafer is observed, the wafer is returned onto the macro-table, and is returned to the original position in the wafer holder with the wafer pickup/return arm.
With this wafer inspecting apparatus, upon macroscopic inspection of the upper and lower surfaces of the wafer, the lower surface of the wafer is held by suction with the wafer holding arm. In the macroscopic inspection of the lower surface, the portion held by suction with the wafer holding arm cannot be seen. Therefore, observation of the entire surface of the wafer cannot be performed, and the precision of macroscopic inspection decreases.
The present invention has been made in view of the above situation, and has as its object to provide a wafer inspecting apparatus and method which enable macroscopic inspection of the entire surface of the wafer.